ABSTRACT
The aim of this chapter is to critically examine the conceptual problems arising from the on-going discussion about language-in-education in Africa, with special attention to challenging issues such as translating, formulating, and teaching modern scientific concepts in endogenous African languages and cultural frames. Based on the observation that beyond the initial stages of primary and secondary schools, very few countries in Africa have successfully implemented the use of local languages for teaching and learning at higher education level, the chapter endeavours to analyse the underlying reasons for stagnation and/or resistance. Are those local languages that are still left out of academic life definitively defective because they intrinsically lack the required conceptual resources for formulating and transmitting modern scientific knowledge? Are the reasons for the enduring use of former colonial languages as exclusive vehicles for science and technology fundamentally to be found in the lack of a culture of systematic translation? Looking beyond widespread dichotomies, this chapter reconsiders some conceptual and practical implications of translation in African postcolonial academic contexts.
